


Three Days

by emynn



Category: Queer as Folk (US)
Genre: Angst, Gap Filler, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-02-23
Updated: 2015-02-23
Packaged: 2018-03-14 18:49:53
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 654
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3421652
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/emynn/pseuds/emynn
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Three days is a long time to wait for a miracle. Takes place right after 1 x 22.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Three Days

**Author's Note:**

> Written for the QAF 30 Day Challenge for Day 15: Write a quick fic up to 500 words from the point of view from any character. This got slightly longer than that, but I still think I showed remarkable restraint. ;-)

He feels nothing the first day.

No fears, no guilt, no pain. He thinks of nothing. He is nothing. Like a dying star collapsing upon itself, Brian’s entire being is a black hole, and the pull of it keeps him trapped to that plastic chair. Everything he was and is, sucked away, gone, leaving an endless void.

It hits him the second day. He’s suddenly aware of Mikey pressing a bottle of water in his hands, and he takes a cautious sip. Just at that moment he sees Mrs. Taylor hurry by, her hair mussed but otherwise looking as pristine as ever, with Daphne by her side. Something makes her look over, and that look she gives Brian – grief, rage, fear, disgust, _betrayal_ – is somehow enough to pierce through him. It’s everything Brian knows he knows he should be feeling, and the force of it hits him like a blow. He leans forward until he’s nearly doubled over, head in hands.

He feels Michael’s hand on his shoulder, dimly thinks he heard Daphne asking if he’s okay, but it’s no use. Blood pounds in his ears, deafening him. A hand comes to rest in the tangles of his hair, and he vomits all over the white linoleum floor.

A nurse hurries over and brings Brian to an unoccupied patient’s room. She checks his vitals – all normal, at least in a medical sense – and shows him to the bathroom. He steps into the shower, lets the water slice through him like scalding rays, but doesn’t bother reaching for the soap. The numbness is fading away, being replaced with something far more raw and excruciating, and Brian doesn’t know if he’ll ever be able to leave this tiny sterilized shower stall. He thinks he might be crying, he knows at some point he screams, and then it’s all too much, and he’s crouched in the corner of the shower, head bent back against the cold tiles, waiting for it all to come to an end.

When Michael turns off the water and the cold air bursts over him, Brian wants to puke again. Instead he allows Michael to hand him a towel and lead him to the room. The nurse is there, gathering his clothes, and Michael explains she’s going to take them to be washed. Brian nods, not giving a shit, until he sees her pick up the white scarf and hold it over the biowaste bin.

“That’s mine,” he says, and snatches it back. His voice is scratchy; they’re the only words he’s spoken since the police took his statement upon his arrival. He sees Michael and the nurse exchange a look, but he ignores them, grabs the change of clothes Michael brought, and heads back to the bathroom.

On the third day, they tell him Justin’s going to be okay. They’re keeping him in a medically-induced coma, but he’s made it through the worst of it, and they have every reason to believe he’ll pull through.

Brian closes his eyes, and in his head he hears the voice of that old minister his mother used to drag him to see, proclaiming in the most booming and sanctimonious of voices that _on the third day, He rose again_. The indomitable Justin Taylor, that one beam of light that had made Brian briefly believe in something more. His own fucking personal savior. And he’d be all right. Well, alive, anyway. Brain injuries were tricky things.

Brian opens his eyes. Daphne’s standing there, beaming, with a nurse by her side. He can hear Michael's voice over the steady drone of the AC. _What a relief. It really is a miracle. Isn’t it, Brian?_

Brian says nothing. He drapes the scarf over his shoulders as he stands, gives the group a nod, and heads toward the exit.

His penance is heavy around his neck. The savior may have risen, but Brian has his own cross to bear.


End file.
